Report of the Iskra Editorial Board to the Meeting (Conference) of R.S.D.L.P. Committees[2]

Published:
First Published in 1923, in Vol. V of the Collected Works of N. Lenin (V. Ulyanov).
Published according to the manuscript.
Source:Lenin
Collected Works,
Progress Publishers,
1964,
Moscow,
Volume 6,
pages 97-106.
Translated: ??? ???
Transcription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:
Lenin Internet Archive
(2003).
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display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
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• README

March5, 1902.

Comrades!Only the day before yesterday we received notice of the meeting
to be called for March 21, together with the entirely unexpected
information that the original plan to hold a conference had been
superseded by a plan to convene a Party congress. We do not know who is
responsible for this sudden and unmotivated change. On our part, we
consider it most unfortunate. We protest against such rapid changes in
decisions on highly complex and important Party measures, and strongly
recommend a return to the original plan for a conference.

Tobe convinced of the necessity for this, it is enough, in our opinion,
to give more careful consideration to the agenda (Tagesordnung)
of the congress, which was likewise communicated to us only the day before
yesterday; more over, we do not know whether this is only a draft
Tagesordnung, and whether this agenda has been proposed by one or
by several organisations. The agenda provides for nine questions to be
discussed by the congress in the following order (I am giving a brief
summary of the points): A) the economic struggle; B) the political
struggle; C) political agitation; D) May Day; E) the attitude towards
opposition elements; F) the attitude towards revolutionary groups
unaffiliated to the Party; G) organisation of the Party; H) the Central
Organ, and I) representatives and Party organisations abroad.

First,in its architecture and in the wording of the individual questions
this agenda produces an irresistible
impression of
“economism.”[3]
We do not of course think that the organisation proposing this agenda
would entertain “economist” views to this day (although to
some extent this is not altogether impossible), but we ask the
comrades to remember that it is also necessary to take into account both
the opinion held by international revolutionary Social-Democracy, and
those survivals of “economism” which are still widespread in
our country. Just imagine: the advanced party of political struggle calls
a congress at a time when all revolutionary and opposition forces in the
country, which have begun a direct attack on the autocracy, are straining
every effort—and all of a sudden we lay chief stress on the
“economic struggle”, with “politics”
following only in the wake!! Is this not a copy of the
traditional error of our “economists,” who claim that political
agitation (resp. struggle) should come after the economic? Is it
possible to imagine that it would occur to any European Social-Democratic
Party, during a revolutionary period, to place the question of the
trade-union movement before all other questions? Or take this separation
of the question of political agitation from the question of the political
struggle! Does it not smack of the usual fallacy which contraposes the
political struggle to political agitation as something fundamentally
different, something belonging to a different stage? Or, lastly, how is
one to explain the fact that demonstrations figure in the agenda
primarily as a means of the economic struggle!?? After
all, we must not forget that at the present time a number of
elements hostile to Social-Democracy are levelling against all
Social-Democracy the accusation of “economism”: these
accusations are being made by
Nakanune,[4]
by Vestnik Russkoi Revolutsii, by
Svoboda,[1][5]
and even (even!) by Russkoye Bogatstvo. We must not forget that
whatever resolutions the conference may adopt, the agenda itself will
remain a historical document by which the level of our entire Party’s
political development will be judged.

Secondly,it is astonishing that the agenda raises (a few days before the
congress!) questions that should be
discussed only after thorough preparations, only when it is possible to
adopt really definite and comprehensible decisions on them—otherwise
it is better not to discuss them at all for the time being. For example,
points E and F: the attitude towards opposition and other revolutionary
trends. These questions must be discussed in advance, from all angles,
reports drawn up on them, and differences in existing shades made
clear—only then can we adopt decisions that would actually offer
something new, that would serve as a real guide for the whole
Party, and not merely repeat some traditional “generalisation.” In
point of fact, just consider: can we in a few days prepare a comprehensive
and well-grounded decision that would take into consideration all the
practical requirements of the movement on the questions of the attitude
towards the “revolutionary-socialist Svoboda group”
or towards the new-born “Socialist-Revolutionary Party”? This apart
from the strange impression, to say the least, that will be produced on
every one by the fact that revolutionary groups unaffiliated to the Party
are mentioned, while nothing is said on so important a question as the
attitude towards the
Bund,[6]
or a revision of the clauses dealing with the latter, in the resolutions
of the First Congress of the Party.

Thirdly—andmost important—there is an unpardonable omission
in the agenda: not a word is said of the stand taken by
present-day Russian revolutionary Social-Democracy on matters of
principle, or of its Party programme. At a time when the
whole world is clamouring about the “crisis of Marxism,” and all
Russian liberal publicists are clamouring even about its collapse and
disappearance, when the question of the “two trends in Russian
Social-Democracy” has not only been placed on the order of the
day, but has even found its way into various lecture programmes, into the
programmes for propagandists’ talks and self-education groups—at a
time like this it is quite impossible to pass over these questions in
silence. We, comrades, are being ridiculed by our opponents, who·
already say even in print (see Nadezhdin, “The Eve of the
Revolution”) that we have grown accustomed to “reporting that all’s
well”!...

Inour opinion, all the above-mentioned shortcomings in the agenda prove
convincingly how irrational is the
plan to convert into a congress a conference that has already been
summoned. We understand, of course, how keenly everyone feels the fact
that there has been no Party congress since 1898, how tempting the idea is
of using the efforts spent in organising the conference so as to put an
end to this existence of a “party without party institutions.” But
it would be a very great mistake to let these practical considerations
make us forget that from a congress of the Russian Social-Democratic
Labour Party everyone now expects decisions which would be on a level with
all the revolutionary tasks of the present time; that if we fail
to rise to the occasion now, at this truly critical moment, we
may bury all Social-Democracy’s hopes to gain the hegemony in the
political struggle; that it is better not to be grudge an expense of a few
thousand rubles and several months of preparatory organisational work, and
to use the present conference so as to prepare for the summer a congress
that will really be a general Party congress capable of finally
settling all immediate problems both in the sphere of theory (the
theoretical programme) and in the sphere of the political struggle.

Lookat the Socialist-Revolutionaries, who are more and more skilfully
taking advantage of our shortcomings and gaining ground to the detriment
of Social-Democracy. They have only just formed a “party,” founded a
theoretical organ, and decided to launch a political
monthly newspaper. What will be said of the Social-Democrats if
after this event they fail to achieve at their congress results
at least such as these? Are we not running the risk of creating
the impression that when it comes to a clear-cut programme and
revolutionary organisation the Social-Democrats are not ahead of this
“party,” which is known to be gathering around it self all sorts of
indeterminate, undetermined, and even undeterminable elements?

Inview of all this we believe that the present congress of committee
representatives should not be declared the Second regular Congress of the
Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, but an unofficial
conference. This conference s main and immediate task should
be to organise and prepare for next summer a real general Party
congress capable of endorsing the Party programme, making final
arrangements for publication of a political weekly organ of the Party, and
in general bringing about the complete and actual unification of all
committees and even of all groups (in
print-shops,[7]
etc.) of Social-Democrats on the basis of steadfastness of principle,
loyalty to the principles of revolutionary Social-Democracy, and genuinely
militant preparedness for offensive political action.

Proceedingfrom this basic idea, we take the liberty of submitting to the
comrades for their consideration the following Tagesordnung for
our conference:

1.Statement of principles. In the resolution on this question an
emphatic stand should be taken against those deplorable attempts to
restrict our theory and our tasks, which were but recently quite
widespread. By vigorously rejecting any such restrictions the Party
conference will make an important contribution to the unification of all
Social-Democrats on matters of principle and will re establish the shaken
prestige of revolutionary Marxism. Some comrades may perhaps express. fear
that discussion on the statement of principles will take up a great deal
of time and divert attention from practical questions. We do not in the
least share these apprehensions, for we believe that the extensive debates
in the illegal press have cleared up the question so well that we shall
reach an agreement on the principles of revolutionary Social-Democracy
with great speed and ease. On the other hand, it is utterly impossible to
do without a statement of principles.

Moreover,the removal of this question from the conference’s
Tagesordnung would in any case fail in its purpose since the very
same question would inevitably come up, only in more disjointed form, in
the discussion of the resolutions on the economic struggle, the political
struggle, etc. For this reason it would be far more expedient to first
finish with this matter, refrain from splitting up our resolutions on
political agitation, strikes, and so on, and give one connected exposition
of the view on our main tasks.

Onour part, we will endeavour to prepare a draft of this resolution and
append it to this report (if time permits).

2.The Second regular Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour
Party. Here we have in view the preliminary (and, of course, to a
certain extent tentative)
decision on the question of the date of the congress (summer, or not later
than autumn, since it is desirable to end it before the next
“season”), the place (in connection with which the conditions of
secrecy must be carefully considered), the funds required for its
arrangement (Iskra, on its part, would be prepared to immediately
contribute 500 rubles for this purpose, from a certain special donation it
has received; we would possibly be able soon to find another such sum or
even more. We should discuss how many thousand rubles it will
approximately cost, and practical ways of raising the rest); lastly, the
general principles of representation and the fullest possible
representation (i. e., so as to ensure representation of definite
pre-selected committees and certain groups, and possibly also of study
circles of Russian Social-Democrats, to say nothing of the comparatively
easy task of securing representatives from the two Social- Democratic
organisations abroad; a procedure should also be adopted for discussing
the question of inviting to the congress such organisations that may be
founded in the interim between conference and congress, etc., etc.).

3.Election 01
an Organising Committee. Generally speaking, the task of this
O.C. should be to implement conference decisions, make preparations for
and arrange the congress, set a final date and place for the latter,
attend to its practical organisation, arrange such matters as the
transport of literature, and establish Party print-shops in Russia (with
the aid of Iskra, two local print-shop groups sympathising with
our publications have been formed in Russia; they have succeeded in
publishing in their two print-shops Nos. 10 and 11 of Iskra, the
pamphlets. What Next?, The Tenth Anniversary 01 the Morozov Strike,
The Speech by Pyotr Alexeyev, The Indictment in the Obukhov Case, and
many others, as well as a number of leaflets. We hope that representatives
from these local groups will be able to participate in the work of the
conference and that they will assist in every way in the accomplishment of
the general Party tasks); further, it should give assistance to various
local organisations, labour unions, students’ organisations, and so on and
so forth. With the support of all organisations, this 0. C. could, in the
space of three or four months, fully prepare the ground for the
formation of a real Central Committee, capable de facto of
directing the entire political struggle of our Party.

Inview of the complexity and variety of the O.C.’s tasks, it should, in
our opinion, consist of a fairly large number of members (5-7), who should
be directed to elect a bureau, distribute functions among themselves, and
hold several meetings prior to the congress.

4.Election of a committee for preparing a draft Party programme.
As the editors of Iskra (including the Emancipation of Labour
group[8])
have already been working on this difficult job for a long time, we
venture to propose the following plan to the comrades. We have already
completed the entire draft of the practical section of the programme,
including the draft agrarian programme, and, besides, two
variants for the theoretical part of the programme have been prepared. Our
representative will acquaint the conference with these drafts, should this
be found necessary and if nothing comes up to prevent him from doing
so. From these two variants, we are at present drawing up a single general
draft, but of course we should not like to make it public in its rough
form, i.e., before the work is completed. Should the conference elect
several persons to collaborate with our Editorial Board in the preparation
of the programme, that might perhaps be the most practical solution of the
question.

Forour part, we can in any case give the comrades an immediate formal
undertaking to submit within a few weeks the final draft of the Party
programme, which we intended to publish in advance in Iskra, so
as to enable all comrades to get acquainted with it, and to
obtain their comments.

5.The Central Organ. In view of the tremendous difficulties
involved in launching a periodical which would appear regularly and be
adequately provided with literary and technical facilities, the conference
will most likely follow the example of the First Congress of the Party and
choose an existing publication. Whether the question is settled in this
way, or whether it is decided to launch an entirely new periodical, it
will in any case be necessary to instruct a special committee, or better
still the same Organising Committee, to undertake the preparatory work
and to discuss the matter from all angles together with the existing or
newly-elected editorial board.

Itwould be essential, in our opinion, to draw the Emancipation of Labour
group into this discussion, for without its co-operation and guidance we
cannot imagine the proper organisation of a political organ that would be
consistent in principle and would in general meet all the requirements of
the movement.

Inasmuchas attempts to establish a fortnightly periodical have already
been made before the conference, the Party should make it its immediate
task to establish a weekly newspaper: this would be fully
possible given really joint work on such a paper by all
Russian Social-Democrats.

6.Preparation of the agenda for the Party congress and reports on
that agenda. The conference should draw up part of this agenda
itself, and entrust part of it to the Organising Committee; it should
without fail appoint (resp. find) reporters on each
question. Only by appointing re porter.s in advance is it possible to
ensure a truly comprehensive discussion of the various questions and
correct decisions on them at the congress (some of the reports could be
printed beforehand in full or in part, and discussed in the press; for
instance, we hope to publish soon an almost completed treatise on the
agrarian programme of Russian Social-Democracy, etc., written by a
member of the Editorial
Board,[* See pp. 107-50 of this
volume.—Ed.]
etc.).

7.Current practical questions of the movement—for example,
a) discussion and endorsement of a May Day leaflet (resp.
discussion of drafts submitted by Iskra and other organisations).

b)The May Day demonstration—the time and methods of its
organisation.

c)Instructions to the Organising Committee to assist in organising
boycotts, demonstrations, etc., and at the same time gradually to prepare
the minds of Party members, and likewise the forces and means of the
Party, for a general uprising of the people.

d)Various financial questions relating to the maintenance of the Organising
Committee, etc.

Concludingour report on the tasks and Tagesordnung of our
congress, we shall only remark that it. is absolutely impossible for us to
draw up a detailed report on the work of Iskra because we are
extremely pressed for time. We are therefore compelled to limit ourselves
to the following brief outline.

1.The conference categorically rejects each and every attempt to inject
opportunism into the revolutionary class movement of the
proletariat—attempts which have found expression in the so-called
“criticism of Marxism,”
Bernsteinism,[9]
and “economism.” At a time when the bourgeoisie of all countries is
rejoicing over the so widely publicised “crisis in socialism,” the
conference declares, in the name of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour
Party, its solidarity with the revolutionary international
Social-Democratic movement, and expresses its firm conviction that
Social-Democracy will emerge from this crisis stronger than ever and
prepared for a relentless struggle for the achievement of its great
ideals.

2.The conference declares its solidarity with the Manifesto of the
Russian Social-Democratic Labour
Party[10]
and confirms that it considers the overthrow of the autocracy the
immediate political task of the Party. The conference declares that in its
work for the accomplishment of this immediate task as well as of its
ultimate aim Social-Democracy lays chief stress on all-round and
nation-wide political agitation which calls on the proletariat to fight
against all manifestations of economic, political, national, and social
oppression, whatever section of the population this oppression is directed
against. The conference declares that the Party will support every
revolutionary and progressive opposition movement directed against the
existing political and social system. The conference particularly
recommends, as practical methods of struggle, the organisation of
boycotts, manifestations at theatres, etc., as well as organised mass
demonstrations. The conference advises all Party committees and groups to
devote
due attention to the need for preparatory measures for a nation-wide armed
uprising against the tsarist autocracy.

3.The conference declares that Russian Social-Democracy will continue as
heretofore to guide the economic struggle of the proletariat, will strive
to extend and deepen it, to strengthen its ideological and organisational
bonds with the Social-Democratic labour movement, and will endeavour to
take advantage of every manifestation of this struggle so as to develop
the political consciousness of the proletariat and draw the latter into
the political struggle. The conference declares that there is no need what
ever to conduct agitation from the very outset on an economic basis alone,
or to consider economic agitation in general to be the most widely
applicable means of drawing the masses into the political struggle.

Notes

[2]
Report of the Iskra Editorial Board, which was written by
Lenin, was intended for the conference of committees and organisations
of the R.S.D.L.P. held on March 23-28 (April 5-10), 1902, in
Belostok. Represented at the conference were: the St. Petersburg and
Ekaterinoslav committees of the R.S.D.L.P., the League of Southern
Committees and Organisations of the R.S.D.L.P., the Central Committee of
the Bund and its Foreign Committee, the Union of Russian
Social-Democrats Abroad, and the Iskra Editorial Board (whose
representative, F. I. Dan, had a mandate from the League of Russian
Revolutionary Social-Democracy Abroad). Through the fault of the
conference organisers, who were “economists,” the delegate of the
Iskra Editorial Board arrived late, after the conference had
begun, while F. V. Lengnik, the representative of the Russian
Iskra organisation, did not get to the conference at all,
although he arrived in Belostok in good time. The representative of the
Nizbni-Novgorod Committee (Iskra trend), A. I. Piskunov, who
arrived in Belostok before Dan, protested at the absence of
representatives of organisations of the Iskra trend, and soon
left. The “economists” and the Bundists, who supported them,
had intended to convert the conference into the Second Congress of the
R.S.D.L.P., reckoning thereby to strengthen their own
position in the ranks of Russian Social-Democracy and paralyse
Iskra’s growing influence. Their attempt, however, failed, both
because of the conference’s comparatively limited composition (only four
of the R.S.D.L.P. organisations operating in Russia were represented)
and the deep disagreements on matters of principle, which were revealed
at the conference; in particular, the Iskra delegate, who
raised strong objection to the conference being converted into a Party
congress, stated that the conference had not been properly prepared and
authorised.

TheBelostok Conference adopted a constituting resolution and a
theoretical resolution, proposed by the delegate of the Bund Central
Committee, with amendments made by the representative of the League of
Southern Committees and Organisations of the R.S.D.L.P. (the
Iskra delegate, who had advanced his own draft of the
theoretical resolution, voted against). The conference also approved the
text of a May Day leaflet, which was based on a draft drawn up by the
Iskra Editorial Board. The conference elected an Organising
Committee to prepare the Second Party Congress, consisting of
representatives of Iskra (F. I. Dan), the League of Southern
Committees and Organisations of the R.S.D.L.P.
(0. A. Yermansky), and the Central Committee of the Bund
(K. Portnoi). Soon after the conference, most of its delegates,
including two members of the Organising Committee, were arrested by the
police. A new Organising Committee to prepare the Second Congress of the
R.S.D.L.P. was formed in November 1902 in Pskov at a conference of
representatives of the R.S.D.L.P.’s St. Peters burg Committee, the
Russian organisation of Iskra, and the Yuzhny Rabochy
(Southern Worker) group.

[3]“Economism”— an opportunist trend in Russian
Social-Democracy at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the
twentieth centuries, a Russian variety of international opportunism. The
news paper Rabochaya Mysl (Workers’ Thought) (1897-1902) and the
magazine Rabocheye Dyelo (Workers’ Cause) (1899-1902) were organs
of the “economists.”

In1899 there appeared Credo, a manifesto of the
“economists,” which was drawn up by E. D. Kuskova. When Lenin, then
in exile, received a copy of Credo, he wrote A Protest by
Russian Social Democrats, in which he sharply criticised the
programme of the “economists.” This protest was discussed and
unanimously adopted at a conference of 17 Marxists serving terms of
political exile, held in the village of Yermakovskoye, in Minusinsk
Region. The “economists” limited the tasks of the working
class to an economic struggle for higher wages and better working
conditions, etc., asserting that the political struggle was the business
of the liberal bourgeoisie. They denied the leading role of the party of
the working class, considering that the party should merely observe the
spontaneous process of the movement and register events. In their
deference to spontaneity in the working-class movement, the
“economists” belittled the significance of revolutionary
theory and class-consciousness, asserted that socialist ideology could
arise
out of the spontaneous movement, denied the need to instill socialist
consciousness into the working-class movement, and thereby cleared the way
for bourgeois ideology. The “economists,” who opposed the need to
create a centralised working-class party, stood for the sporadic and
amateurish character of individual circles and fostered confusion and
wavering in the Social-Democratic movement. “Economism”
threatened to divert the working class from the class revolutionary path
and turn it into a political appendage of the bourgeoisie.

Lenin’sIskra played a major part in the struggle against
“economism.” By his book, What Is to Be Done?, which
appeared in March 1902, V. I. Lenin brought about., the final ideological
rout of “economism.”

[4]Nakanune (On the Eve)—a monthly magazine of the Narodnik
trend, published in Russian in London from January 1899 to February 1902
under the editorship of W. A. Serebryakov; 37 numbers were issued. Grouped
round the magazine, which advocated general democratic views, were
representatives of various petty-bourgeois parties and trends; a hostile
attitude to Marxism in general and to Russian revolutionary
Social-Democracy in particular was characteristic of Nakanune.

[5]Svoboda (Freedom)—a magazine published in Switzerland by
the “revolutionary-socialist” group Sooboda, founded
by E. O. Zelensky (Nadezhdin) in May 1901. Only two numbers of the
magazine appeared: No. tin 1901 and No. 2 in 1902. V. I. Lenin considered
that the Svoboda group belonged to those “rootless
groupings” which had “neither settled serious views,
programmes, tactics, and organisations, nor roots in the masses”
(see present edition, Vol. 20, “On Adventurism”). In its
publications (besides Svoboda, the group published The Eve of
Revolution. An Irregular Review of Problems of Theory and Tactics,
No. 1; the newspaper-magazine Otkliki [Responses], No. 1;
Nadezhdin’s programmatic pamphlet, The Rebirth of Revolutionism in
Russia, and others) the Svoboda group advocated the ideas of
terrorism and “economism.” In a bloc with the St. Petersburg
“economists,” it came out against Iskra and the
St. Petersburg Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. The group ceased to exist in
1903.

[6]The Bund— the General Jewish Workers’ Union of Lithuania,
Poland, and Russia—was organised in 1897 at an inaugural congress of
Jewish Social-Democratic groups in Vilno; in the main, it united
semi-proletarian elements of the Jewish artisans in the Western regions of
Russia. At the First Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. (1898), the Bund joined
the Party “as an autonomous organisation, independent only in regard
to questions specially concerning the Jewish proletariat.”

TheBund brought nationalism and separatism into the Rus sian working-class
movement and took an opportunist stand on the most important questions of the
Social-Democratic movement.
In April 1901, the Bund’s Fourth Congress voted for abolition of the
organisational relations established by the First Congress of the
R.S.D.L.P., stating in its resolution that it regarded the R.S.D.L.P. as a
federative association of national organisations which the Bund should
join as a federative unit.

Atthe Second Congress of the R.S.D.L.P., which rejected the Bund’s demand
that it should be recognised as the sole representative of the Jewish
proletariat, the Bund left the Party, rejoining it in 1906, on the basis
of a decision of the Fourth (Unity) Congress.

Withinthe R.S.D.L.P., the Bundists constantly supported its opportunist
wing (the “economists,” Mensheviks, and liquidators), and waged a
struggle against the Bolsheviks and Bolshevism. To the Bolshevik
programme’s demand for the right of nations to self-determination the Bund
opposed the demand for cultural and national autonomy. During the years of
the Stolypin reaction, the Bund adopted a liquidators’ stand and took an
active part in forming the anti-Party August bloc. During the First World
War, the Bundists took a social-chauvinist stand. In 1917 the Bund
supported the counter-revolutionary Provisional Government and fought on
the side of the enemies of the October Socialist Revolution, its
leadership joining the forces of counter-revolution during the years of
foreign military intervention and civil war. At the same time a swing
towards co-operation with Soviet power was to be observed among the Bund
rank and file. In March 1921 the Bund dissolved itself, part of its
members joining the R.C.P. (B.) on a general basis.

TheKishinev print-shop was organised by L. I. Goldman in April 1901 and
existed until March 12(25), 1902. It printed G. V. Plekhanov’s article,
“What Next?” (reprinted from No. 2-3 of Zarya),
N. K. Krupskaya’s pamphlet, The Working Woman, The Indictment in the
Case 01
the May Disturbances at the Obukhou Factory (reprinted from
Iskra, No. 9, with V. I. Lenin’s article, "The New
Battle,” as a supplement), V. I. Lenin’s articles, “The Struggle
Against Starvation” (reprinted from No. 2-3 of Zarya) and
“The Beginning of Demonstrations” (reprinted from
Iskra, No. 13), and also a number of manifestos an
leaflets. No. 10 of Iskra was reprinted at this print-shop.

TheBaku print-shop (called “Nina” in secret correspondence)
was organised in September 1901 by a group of Baku Iskra-ists
(V. Z. Ketskhoveli, L. B. Krasin, L. I. Galperin, N. P. Kozerenko,
V. Sturna, and others) with the assistance of the Tiflis Committee of the
R.S.D.L.P. Prior to March 1902, when the “Nina” print-shop
temporarily discontinued its work, it had printed the pamphlets,
Spiders and Flies, by W. Liebknecht, The Ways People
Live, by S. Dikstein, The Speech of Pyotr Alexeyev, The Tenth
Anniversary of the Morozov Strike, and proclamations and leaflets in
Russian and Georgian. The Baku print-shop reprinted No. H of
Iskra and printed the Georgian illegal Marxist newspaper
Erdzola (The Struggle). After the Second Congress of the R.S.D.L
P.,
the Baku print-shop became the central Party print-shop and carried out
tasks set by the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. In December 1905, the
print-shop was closed down by decision of the Central Committee of the
Party.

TheEmancipation of Labour group did much to propagate Marxism in
Russia. It translated into the Russian language works by Karl Marx and
Frederick Engels, such as The Manifesto of the Communist Party; Wage
Labour and Capital; Socialism: Utopian and Scientific, publishing
them abroad and distributing them in Russia, and also popularised Marxism
through its publications. The Emancipation of Labour group dealt a severe
blow at Narodism, which was the chief ideological obstacle to the spread
of Marxism and the development of the Social-Democratic movement in
Russia. In his works, Socialism and the Political Struggle
(1883), Our Differences (1885), and others, G. V. Plekhanov gave
a Marxist criticism of the Narodnik theories of Russia’s non-capitalist
path of development, the Narodniks’ subjective-idealist view of the role
of the individual in history, the denial of the proletariat’s leading role
in the revolutionary movement, etc. Written by Plekhanov and published by
the Emancipation of Labour group, the two draft programmes of the Russian
Social-Democrats (1883 and 1885) were an important step in preparing for
and creating the Social-Democratic party in Russia. Of special importance
in spreading Marxist views and in substantiating and defending dialectical
an d historical materialism was Plekhanov’s (N. Beltov’s) book, The
Development of the Monist View of History (1895), on which “an
entire generation of Russian Marxists were trained” see present
edition, Vol. 16 ,“On the Vperyod Group”). The group
published and distributed in Russia four issues of the magazine
Sotsial-Demokrat, as well as a series of popular pamphlets for
workers.

Engelswelcomed the appearance of the Emancipation of Labour group,
“which frankly and without equivocation accepted the great economic
and historical theories of Marx” (see Frederick Engels’ Letter to
V. I. Zasulich, April 23, 1885. Marx and Engels, Selected
Correspondence, Moscow, p. 459). G. V. Plekhanov and V. I. Zasulich
were personal friends of Engels and corresponded with him for many
years. The Emancipation of Labour group established contacts with the
international working-class movement and, beginning with the First
Congress of the Second International in 1889 (Paris) and throughout the
whole of its existence represented Russian Social-Democracy at all
congresses of the International. But the views of the Emancipation of
Labour group also contained serious errors: over-estimation of the liberal
bourgeoisie’s role and under-estimation of the revolutionary nature of
peasant ry as the reserve force of the proletarian revolution. These were
the germ of the future Menshevik views held by Plekhanov and other
members of the group. V. I. Lenin pointed out that the Emancipation of
Labour group “provided only the theoretical foundations of
Social-Democracy and took the first step towards the working-class
movement” (see present edition, Vol. 20, “The Ideological
Struggle in the Working-Class Movement”).

In1894 the Union of Russian Social-Democrats Abroad was formed on the
initiative of the Emancipation of Labour group. The members of the
Emancipation of Labour group and their adherents left the Union in 1900
and founded the Sotsial-Demokrat revolutionary
organisation. G. V. Plekhanov, P. B. Axelrod, and V. I. Zasulich, who were
members of the group, were on the Editorial Board of Iskra and
Zarya. At the Second Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. in August 1903,
the Emancipation of Labour group announced that it had ceased to exist.

[9]Bernsteinism—a trend hostile to Marxism in the German and
international Social-Democratic movement, which originated at the end of
the nineteenth century and was named after Eduard Bernstein, the most
outspoken representative of revisionism.

In1896-98 Bernstein wrote a series of articles entitled “Problems
of Socialism” for the magazine Die Neue Zeit, the
theoretical organ of German Social-Democracy. In these articles, he tried
under the guise of “freedom of criticism” to revise (hence the
word “revisionism”) the philosophical, economic, and political
foundations of revolutionary Marxism and to substitute for them bourgeois
theories of reconciliation of class contradictions and of class
collaboration. He attacked Marx’s doctrine of the impoverishment of the
working class, the growth of class contradictions, crises, the inevitable
collapse of capitalism, socialist revolution and the dictatorship of the
proletariat, and brought forward a programme of social-reformism expressed
in the formula: “the movement is everything, the final
goal—nothing.” In 1899 Bernstein’s articles appeared in a hook
entitled The Premises of Socialism and the Tasks of
Social-Democracy. The book had the support of German
Social-Democracy’s Right wing, and of opportunist elements in other
parties of the Second International, including the Russian
“economists.”

Bernsteinismwas condemned at the congresses of the German
Social-Democratic Party in Stuttgart (October 1898), Hanover (October
1899), and Lübeck (September 1901). However, the Party leadership did
not show sufficient determination in opposing Bernstein and his adherents,
but adopted a conciliatory attitude. The Bernsteinites continued their
open propaganda of revisionist ideas in the magazine Sozialistische
Monatshefte (Socialist Monthly) and in the Party organisations.

Headedby V. I. Lenin, the Bolshevik Party alone waged a consistent and
resolute struggle against Bernsteinism and its adherents and followers in
Russia. As early as 1899, Lenin came out against the Bernsteinites in his
“A Protest by Russian Social-Democrats” and in his article,
“Our Programme” (see present edition, Vol. 4, pp. 167-82 and
210-14). His writings, “Marxism and
Revisionism” (see present edition, Vol. 15), “Differences in the
European Labour Movement” (see present edition, Vol. 16), and
others, were also devoted to an exposure of Bernsteinism.

[10]
The reference is to the Manifesto of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour
Party, issued in 1898 by the Central Committee of the R.S.D.L.P. on the
instructions and in the name of the Party’s First Congress. The Manifesto
put forward the struggle for political liberty and the overthrow of the
autocracy as the chief task of Russian Social-Democracy, and linked the
political struggle with the general tasks of the working-class movement.

[11]Rabocheye Dyelo (Workers’ Cause)—a magazine that was the
organ of the Union of Russian Social-Democrats Abroad. It was published in
Geneva from April 1899 to February 1902 under the editorship of
B. N. Krichevsky, P. F. Teplov (Sibiryak), V. P. Ivanshin, and later also
A. S. Martynov. Twelve numbers (9 books) were issued in all. The Editorial
Board of Rabocheye Dyelo was the “economists’\thinspace" centre
abroad. The magazine supported Bernstein’s slogan of “freedom of
criticism” of Marxism, took an opportunist stand on questions of
Russian Social-Democracy’s tactics and organisational tasks, denied the
revolutionary possibilities of the peasantry, and so on. Its supporters
propagated opportunist ideas of subordinating the proletariat’s political
struggle to the economic, exalted spontaneity in the working-class
movement and denied the Party’s leading role. V. P. Ivanshin, one of the
editors of Rabocheye Dyelo, also took part in editing
Rabochaya Mysl (Workers’ Thought), organ of the outspoken
“economists,” which Rabocheye Dyelo supported. At the
Second Congress of the R.S.D.L.P., the Rabocheye Dyelo supporters
represented the extreme Right, opportunist wing of the Party.